


Silence

by AlleiraDayne



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Angst, Angst and Tragedy, Character Death, Death, F/M, Heavy Angst, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Tragedy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-12
Updated: 2017-11-12
Packaged: 2019-02-01 12:06:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,614
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12704667
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AlleiraDayne/pseuds/AlleiraDayne
Summary: Alistair searches for his wife.





	Silence

[ ](https://www.flickr.com/photos/138010791@N02/25010209267/in/album-72157662981371817/)

_Warden Alistair,_

_I send this letter with deepest regret. I love her, too, and pray to the Maker that she returns to you soon._

_Love,_

_Leliana_

The paper crumpled in Alistair’s hand, and for a moment, his longing drowned the song that echoed in the caverns of his head. Two years ago, the faintest hint of the Calling started, a dull drone in his subconscious, and for a time, he ignored it. But the months dragged and with each passing day, the song sharpened, took shape until it overpowered his concentration.

And by then, it was too late.

Alistair sat at his desk, paper in hand and scowl marring his face. Leliana had been his last hope, his final effort to locate his wife. The song drowned out her voice, her face, her piercing green eyes, and after weeks of sleeplessness, Warden Alistair forgot his wife’s face.

He remembered her. But after two years listening to the song, parts of his mind succumbed to madness, and he wept the day he tried to remember her face, but failed. Nothing had prepared him for this, for the Calling’s cruel price. And nothing had prepared him to walk that path alone.

But he remembered her. As did Leliana and Morrigan, although neither had seen nor heard from her in years. And the last letter he’d received from her had arrived a year past. Amodisia did not allow people to fret over her. But there Alistair sat, slumped in his chair, thinking of nothing but her.

For the first time in years, he recalled her smile, the small curl of her lips and crinkle at the corners of her eyes. _Green_ eyes, like the forest in spring, bright and bold. Brown hair, long and flowing to her backside. Quick of wit, her tongue never rested. And intellect for eons, Amodisia talked of anything and everything.

“Maker,” he breathed, “bring her back to me.”

Though his chair held him fast, Alistair climbed to his feet and shuffled to his lonesome bed, climbing beneath the cold sheets. Beside him lay her empty pillow, and resting atop it lay her departing letter. A cure. She’d left the Wardens to search for a cure, promising her return when she did. But return she had not, five years absent, one year missing. Not a soul in Thedas knew where Warden-Commander Amodisia Theirin had gone.

And in his grief, Alistair wept.

* * *

The gate bells rang in unison, echoing across the yard and announcing a new visitor to the fortress. But no one met their guest, no watchmen or guards, not a single warden in sight. Amodisia stood in the courtyard alone but for the sinking dread in the pit of her stomach.

Across the way, she spotted the Grey Warden banner shrouded in a shawl of black. Hoping against every instinct in her body, Amodisia sprinted up the main stairway for the fortress. There she encountered her first fellow Wardens, shocked to see her but instead of brightening their day, they recoiled in horror.

The song had extracted its price on her. Silvery eyes and sallow skin, Warden-Commander Amodisia Theirin was a shell of her former self. But that failed to matter, now. She had returned to her Wardens from her search, successful, triumphant.

She had discovered a cure.

_Too late._

More Wardens found deeper in the recesses of the fortress stared as she strode past, their pitiful looks confirming her worst fear. And outside her quarters stood a throng of Wardens, their chattering fading to silence as she approached.

At first, not a soul moved, men and women gaping. Spine straight as iron, Amodisia motioned to the door and spoke.

“Show me.”

“Warden-Commander,” a captain saluted. “It may not be a good—”

“Show. Me,” she growled. “Now.”

The group parted, some slinking down the hall, others trapped against the walls. The captain pushed aside the door, allowing Amodisia past the threshold. One foot before the other, she stepped, a slow plod of each boot on heavy stone. Prayers fell on deaf ears as she entered the room, unanswered, ignored, for Alistair lay in bed, still as stone but for the shallow rise and fall of his chest.

“Leave us.”

Without argue, the captain closed the solid oak door with a _thump_ , but Amodisia moved not an inch, unwilling to face the truth. Her companion of twenty years, her closest friend and lover, lay dying not four feet away, and yet she refused to step any closer.

Sunken eyes, once golden with life but now a dull grey, struggled to open, squinting in the dim candlelight. And for a moment, Alistair gazed upon his wife, unseeing, glassy and void of the love they once held.

“Sia?”

Her sorrow burst from pursed lips, a sob echoing through the room as a hand clamped over her mouth. Too late. She had hoped beyond all reason that, though the calling had started its song years ago for her, it might have spared Alistair, so strong in his faith. But faith alone proved futile against the taint, claiming him like every warden before them.

“Why are you here?”

His brow furrowed, chin tucking beneath the linens and eyes searching her face. “I waited. I knew you’d—”

A barking cough interrupted his thought as Alistair doubled over in pain, arms clinging the sheets to his chest. And in that moment of pain, Amodisia buckled. She leaped to the bed, kicking off her boots and tossing her gloves and cloak to the floor to climb beneath the sheets. When his massive arms wrapped around her, and Amodisia wept.

“Did you find it?”

She nodded, wiping tears from her face. “I did.”

“We should get started, then? No?”

Another sob wracked her body, unable to speak. And Maker bless him, Alistair merely held her, arms wrapped tight around her shoulders. Every time she hoped to explain, to tell him the truth, tears consumed her, overwhelming and uncontrollable.

“It’s too late,” he started. “Isn’t it?”

Amodisia said nothing, tears and sobs spent, but no words found to agree. There they lay, legs entwined and sharing the warmth of one another one last time.

“You should let them cure you.”

She considered him over her shoulder, terrified by his lifeless grey eyes, sallow skin, and gaunt cheeks. “And do what? Lead the Grey Wardens? Alone? I cannot imagine my life without you Alistair. My calling is not far behind you. It may not even work for me.”

Alistair frowned at that. “The thought of you dying…”

“I know,” she replied. “It hurts unlike any pain I’ve ever felt.”

Tears cascaded down his cheeks, shallow, breathless sobs mirroring hers. “What if we tried it anyway?”

She sniffled through her fingers. “What do you mean?”

“The cure? What is it?”

Maker, ever the optimist. “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

Alistair’s laugh, a sound she had not heard in far too many years, scattered her fears and warmed her very soul. “At this point, I’d believe you even if it involved a dress and the Remigold.”

Her own laughter joined his, a song so old they had memorized every note. “No,” she started. “Remember Andraste’s ashes?”

“The urn? In Haven?”

She nodded. “That’s it.”

A scowl darkened his greying face. “But the temple blew up years ago.”

“It did.”

His glare focused on her, the strongest since she had returned. “Then the urn was destroyed.”

“ _An_ urn was destroyed…”

Realization blossomed, and for a moment, gold flashed in Alistair’s eyes. “You never put it back.”

Amodisia grimaced despite her reasoning. “I had Genetivi hide it. And to do that successfully, to get people to stop looking for it, we planted a decoy and told the entire world he’d found it.”

Alistair gaped, jaw working with questions. “But… how? Where did he keep it?”

“In his house.”

“What?!”

“In Haven.”

A moment passed before Alistair slumped onto his pillow. “That settles it, then. We’re both going to try this cure. Immediately.”

“Ali, please, don’t make me do this, what if it doesn’t work on one of us.”

Her husband shook his head, frown etching lines in his greying skin. “Sia, I won’t do this without you. If you do not wish to be cured, then I won’t either. But if there is even the smallest chance it’ll work, both of us should try.”

A moment’s hesitation lingered before Amodisia acquiesced. “Alright. We’ll try it.”

* * *

_In war, victory. In peace, vigilance. In death, sacrifice_.

She clutched his letter to her chest as bowmen fired their fiery arrows into the river. Downstream, a boat drifted, bearing the shell of a man she once knew. Those arrows found their mark, flames licking the vessel, catching fabric and oil.

Warden-Commander Amodisia Theirin remained vigilant, witnessing the passing of a fellow warden. Along with his letter, she thumbed a small block of clear, ever-frozen ice. Inside rested a red rose in full bloom, eternal as his love for her.

When the boat passed out of sight, Amodisia turned on her heel, shifting her pack on one shoulder and heading for the gates of Redcliffe. There, she’d find a horse waiting, ready to take her on her last great adventure.

Alone.

 _Silence_  
_Here in the sunset of my life_  
_I've been walking through the darkness_  
_With your ghost by my side_  
_How I've tried_  
_But never can stop the pain I feel_  
_I have tried so hard_  
_But the wounds never heal_  
  
_Now the time has come_  
_For one last goodbye_  
_As I raise my head and gaze up to the skies_  
_I have tried in vain_  
_But this is the end_  
_We'll meet again_  
_I won't be again_


End file.
